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Years passed by; and when voices broke the silence once more, they were clear and familiar. All around was hurry of feet and clank of metal. Horses neighed and champed outside, and through the general sound came whispers of "Essex" and "Rupert", "Parliament" and "Independent". I looked for the beautiful marble effigy loft by the Knights of Jerusalem. It still remained intact. No! they were not Ironsides. They were ordinary Englishmen, but just a little excited. Their clamour lasted long, and when it subsided strange booms sounded in the distance. "Rupert" was in action.
The next scene was different. Three men -- the parish overseers -- sat by a large chest with a book before them. There was the chink of coin; men, boys, and women passed in and out. The last to go was a decrepit old grandmother, who would need to be carried the next time she came to church, probably in a pauper's coffin. The lid of the chest went down with a bang, and the door closed.
It soon opened again. A crowd of men rushed to the bellropes. The bells clamoured and clanged, and as the groaning men stretched down the ropes so that the tongues of the bells might speak again, there came in quick gasps, "Waterloo", "Wellington".
I saw and heard no more. Something gently brushed my lips. My eyes opened and they were met by two bright dancing lights. All illusions were dispelled by a sharp tremor that ran through my body. It was the Universal, the Unchangeable! The unbreakable link with the past! We walked out together, and the door gently closed behind me and my dream.
Futurist Art
The skill'd Apelles, by his Prince decreed
To paint with living line the panting steed,
Employ'd in vain each trick and study'd grace,
The likeness of the charger's foam to trace.
At length, in pique, his dripping brush he flung
Against the canvas horse before him hung--
When lo! by chance there spatter'd o'er each part
The painted lather that defy'd his art!
Thus the wild cubists of a later age
With freakish toil their fancies seek to cage,
Though their poor daubings all would nobler be
Should they splash paint as aimlessly as he!
H.P. Lovecraft
In the Editor's Study
The Vers Libre Epidemic
The alarming prevalence in contemporary periodicals of "poetry without shape, wit, or artistic beauty, has caused no little alarm amongst
